The Director-General of Buildings to the king (or, as we should nowadays call him, Minister of Fine Arts), Lenormant de Tournehem, kinsman to the Pompadour, died suddenly in the November of 1751; the Pompadour promptly caused to be appointed in his place her brother Abel Poisson de Vandières--a shy, handsome youth, a gentleman, a man of honour, who brought to his office an exquisite taste, a loyal nature, and marked abilities. The king, who liked him well, and called him "little brother," soon afterwards created him Marquis de Marigny--and Fragonard, like many another artist of his day, was to be beholden to him. After a couple of years' training under Boucher, Fragonard's master, with that keen interest that he ever took in the efforts and welfare of youth, and particularly of his own pupils, urged the young fellow to compete for the Prix de Rome, pointing out to him the advantages of winning it. At twenty, without preparation, and without being a pupil of the Academy, Fragonard won the coveted prize with his "Jeroboam Sacrificing to Idols." It was in this year that Boucher was given a studio and apartments at the Louvre. For three years thereafter, Fragonard was in the king's school of six _élèves protégés_ under Carle Van Loo. He continued to work in Boucher's studio, as well as painting on his own account; and it is to these years that belong his "Blind Man's Buff" and several pictures in this style. Meanwhile the quarrels between priests and parliaments had grown very bitter. The king took first one side, then the other. It was in 1756, Louis having got foul of his Parliament, that the unfortunate and foolish Damiens stabbed the king with a penknife slightly under the fifth rib of his left side, as he was stepping into his carriage at Versailles, and suffered by consequence the terrible tortures and horrible death that were meted out to such as attempted the part of regicide. This was the year when, at twenty-four, Fragonard was entitled to go to Rome at the king's expense--the Italian tour being a necessary part of an artist's training who desired to reach to academic distinction, and honours in his calling. He started on his journey to Italy with Boucher's now famous farewell advice ringing in his ears: "My dear Frago, you go into Italy to see the works of Raphael and Michael Angelo; but--I tell you in confidence, as a friend--if you take those fellows seriously you are lost." ("Lost" was not the exact phrase, Boucher being a Rabelaisian wag, but it will pass.) [Illustration: PLATE III.--L'ETUDE (In the Louvre)